Some thoughts and short interview with the last Winner

As said in the last post, the event surprisingly ended quite quickly. I had planed that it will last at least 5-7 days, so there was some time to get enough traffic for a few dollars worth of advertisement revenue.

So i thought of a few ideas on how to make it last somewhat longer. There are some ideas I had, you can post your comments below.

• Split the treasure in a few pieces. For example having 3 treasures hidden. So for example first to find a treasure, would get 100 PED the second 60 PED, the third 40 PED
• Instead of showing hints for the treasure directly (like the Stone in the last event), i could show another place (not directly related to the treasure and for example say: “The treasure is x° from this position” and later tell a second and third hint with y° and where they hit, where the treasure can be found
• Similar to the above, but instead of having one fixed x° value, having a range (so its a bit more search work required once you got 2 or more positions). For example 4-12°. With only one hint it will become more and more inaccurate the further you go away from the point the hint is given, but will get more accurate once you found more than one hint
  
• Or simply to wait the full time span of 2 weeks until presenting the winner (even if the winner has found it after 2 days). But imho this idea isn’t too good, as all other people searches would be in vain (but on other side, it would give enough time to generate the revenue to finance the events)
• The next idea is somewhat better: To start the events randomly. i.e. promoting the events, but long before it starts so people who’re interested need to regularly check the event page and see if it has begun.
  Advantage: This way there would be more visitors even in times no event runs
  Disadvantage: Many may miss it, as they don’t regularly check it.
  

The Interview

I’ve did a small interview with the winner of the last event, Firemonkey Fire Aveon.

• 1. Did you participated in the last event?
  No I did not participate in the last event. I first heard of the event the day I found it. It was a few hours before I sent out the screen shots to you. Someone was advertising it at PA.
  
• 2. Do you think the reward (200 PED) was attractive enough to do the treasure hunt? (in the first one it was only 20 PED and was supposed to last 2 weeks)
  Eh 200 PEDs was more than attractive enough for me at least. Though I only ran into 1 person in general at the event area.
  
• 3. How much time did you spent seeking the treasure and what was the detail which gave you the idea where to search?
  I spent a good 3-4 hours searching for the treasure. What gave it away was the rock clusters. The dark green ground helped a little in eliminating what rock clusters to look for, but I still had to check any cluster that was on green ground. This was because your graphic settings might be different than mine (probably a lot better than mine).
  
• 4. Did you got any help (i.e. a friend) or did where you alone seeking it
  I found the treasure alone.
  
• 5. Did you enjoyed the event and would you like to see more events in the future?
  I did enjoy the event. It was pretty challenging. I would like to see another event in the future for it was pretty fun.
  
• 6. Anything you didn't enjoyed or like to see improved in the future?
  The one thing that I just didn't like were the agros that wandered right next to the rock cluster, but that just adds to the challenge. I managed to get them to chase me and I lured them away.
  Odessa: Well the agros wasn’t really planed. When I first placed the treasure, there were no other mobs around and when i checked it the last time (~0:00-1:00 MA time), it was free of mobs too.
  
• 7. Would you participate if was harder to find?
  I would participate if it was harder to find. Though I'm not too sure how you'd make it harder. The screen shot you gave us was vague as hell. Unless you decide to give the participants a larger area to search, but that area it self was pretty large.
  

Winner of Treasure Hunt Event #2

Foreword

This event ended surprisingly fast. To be honest i haven’t expect it to be finished within the first 5 days. Seems I was wrong. The basic idea was to fund the winning pot with income by advertisement and therefore, the longer the event lasts the more money could be gained and placed in the pot.

Maybe the event was to easy, the place chosen badly or the hint was to obviously. Well, the bad side of this is, the event was so short, that barely anyone (other than hand full of people, less than 50) visited the event page and no revenue was generated with the ads. Will take a few days in the auction to recover from this losses *giggles*

Well, guess that’s a risk. Next time I’d have to make it harder then or see if I can some sponsors for it.

The Winner

You must be thinking now: “Blah blah, just tell us the winner”. Right! Here it is. The winner of this event is Firemonkey Fire Aveon from the society Synergen at 2009-03-14 03:34:58 MindArk time! Congratulation to the 200 PED winning price, will contact you within the next few days so we can set a date and time to deliver your price.

Hope you will use it for something useful and not throwing it to fast in the one-armed bandit (also know as Entropia Universe)! :P

The proof

 

Treasure Hunt #02: 13th March – 28th March – Win 200 PED

So, it’s time for the second event. Sadly, I wasn’t able to get a new sponsor for layer ads in the last week, but I’m still looking for one, as Google Adsense is quite unsuitable for this project as it depends on users to click the ads and with PPM advertising the revenues would be much more predictable.

As last week, this event is also absolutely free. NO COSTS, NO REGISTRATION! Everyone can simply join and search for the treasure. Once you found it, submit a screenshot at

Before you start, make sure to read the FAQ and the Rules.

The Event

This time I’ve hidden 7 Mind Essence somewhere on Eudoria. Once you found this treasure, you have to make a screenshot which shows your avatar, the item on the ground, current time and position (P-Key in-game) as well as your name visible and your skills window sorted by points so we can verify that you’re qualified for the event. Don’t for get to add the current event password/key-phrase

Important: Make sure to use the current event password/key-phrase when submitting your screenshots! The event password/key-phrase will change regularly, so make sure you’ll check out often enough to see if there are new hints and/or event password/key-phrase.

The wining pot will be 200 PED this time (which is equivalent to 20.00 USD) and the payout rate is 100%. Every time, a new hint is released where to find the treasure, the payout rate will be reduced by 25%.

If you don’t have an Entropia Universe Account, you can create a new account at the Entropia Universe Homepage and download the client (the registration and client download is free of charge)

The Hints

Hint #1

The first hint contains a map with the zone where to find it and a close picture of the treasure itself.

Zone:

Close View on the Treasure:

Donators/Sponsors

Currently there are no Donators/Sponsors

Winning pot

The current winning pot consists of:

• Advertisement/My own Money: 200.00 PED
• Donations: 0.00 PED
• Sponsors: 0.00 PED
• Total: 200.00 PED
• Payout: 200.00 PED (100%)

How does it work?

It’s very simple, really! You just need to walk through the given area and search for it. Once you think you found it, make a screenshot with the necessary information visible in the screen shot (check out the Rules before starting!) and set it to

Important: Be sure to have 2 things in the subject-line of the mail “Entropia Treasure Hunt” and the current event’s password.
Example: If the current event’s password is “beginner”, the email subject has to be “Entropia Treasure Hunt – beginner”.

The current password can be found on the right side in the navigation!!!

You can basically submit as much screenshots as you want, however to many may disqualify you, especially if we notice that you’re trying to cheat (i.e. faked or edited screenshots). Screenshots have to be in JPEG or PNG format, BITMAPS won’t be accepted!!!

Also, you don’t have to look for all the time. You can just normally go out and hunt or do mining and if you find accidently find it, submit the picture.

If you have any questions, ask it either in the comments or send a mail to

Hope many people will participate and if you’re in-game business owner who wants to sponsor one of the future events, send an email to the address above.

Happy treasure hunting!

Next Event Announcement & Problems of the last Treasure Hunt Event

Next Event

The next event is planed to start between Thursday 6th March 2009 and Friday 13th March.

I’m planning to increase the winning pot for this event significantly! It should be around 150-200 PED!!!

Future Changes

Payout Penalties active

However, with the next event, there will also be a penalty for most hints given. So for every hint, there will usually be 25% penalty in the payout (100% on first Tip, 75% on second, 50% on third, 25% on forth).

But I’ll reserve the right to post some smaller hints, which won’t reduce the payout amount. So the sooner you find the treasure, the more you can win. The first big tip will take a few days to give the people enough time to find the treasure and win the full payout.

Advertising

For the next event I’m also planning to change the advertising platform and try it with Layer/Floating Ads. Google Adsense is very good in some cases and a good amount of traffic, however it relies actively on the content and the users who click on it to generate revenue. While Layer/Floating Ads only require to be shown for a few seconds (~5 seconds) every few hours.

Important thing: You’d need to keep the Layer open for at least 5 seconds before closing it, then it won’t be shown again for a while. If you close it in less than 5 seconds, it will appear again on the next page refresh.

Feel free to leave comments about the new advertising system and the planed winning pot.

But keep in mind: The advertisement will be necessary in order to fund the winning pots, so it’s also vital that people don’t use some fancy banner blockers which could block it, as it will reduce future winning pots or even lead that the events are completely canceled.

The problems

I’ve also encountered a few problems with my current event system. During the last 48 hours the “Treasure” was picked up by someone who wasn’t participating in the event (no submission was sent). Yesterday it happened very often between 16:00 and 03:00 MindArk time, i had to replace it 3 or 4 times.

To be honestly, that surprised me a bit, as i was thinking that the rate of “ninja” pickups would be much smaller. Well, on other side, in the day before it was only picked up once.

I’m not sure how much problems this could cause at a later point. I see that there could be a problem, if people are checking out a certain place after the object was “ninja looted” and don’t come back again.

The only thing i could recommend for now: Check the places more often than just once. I’ll try to regularly check it, but there are also times I’m sleeping or not at home

Maybe I underestimated the “ninja looting” rate, as i thought that there aren’t so many players running around (you usually don’t see many outside of PA and the big cities/meeting points). Or I was just unlucky to place the treasure in a place which is quite close to an teleporter not far way from the starter towns.

For the notes: It was in Billy’s Spaceship Yard in one of the broken Spaceships. The decision for this location was mainly due to it being an introduction event and newcomers should easily be able to access it without having first to run over to the other end of the world.

Future events may have the treasures placed much further away from the next teleporter or the starter areas of Port Atlantis, so the chances will probably be lower that people accidently “ninja loot” the treasure.

If you have any ideas how to improve this, so people don’t accidently loot the treasure, leave a comment please. Any ideas will be welcomed on how to improve the system!

Winner of Treasure Hunt Event #1

We finally got the first winner of the event! Congratulation to Marie TheOne Omega. I’ll drop you an email to set a date when and where to meat for your price.

Side note: Please add the coordinates and time next time too. This time I’ll bend the rules a bit, as there was not so big participation and the Picture of was quite obviously. For future events, please include all necessary information.

The event itself

The participation wasn’t as high as i expected it to be. There were 68 unique visitors in the past few days, only a few of them came back regularly (161 Visits). Well the reason may be the quite low winning pot and therefore I’m going to increase it for the next time and see if more people are willing to participate.

Also if you’re visiting this website, please make sure also to vote, even if you’re not yet qualified for the event. If the demand is high, I may adjust the rules to let the more advanced players to join the event too.